Demonstration against corona policy allowed in Berlin – coronavirus –

The Higher Administrative Court (OVG) of Berlin-Brandenburg confirmed in second instance on Saturday morning that the Berlin police ban will not last. This decision is now final.

Following its decision, the court announced that the meetings against the crown policy of the federal and state governments planned by various initiatives could take place on August 29, 2020. The Higher Administrative Court of Berlin-Brandenburg essentially confirmed two urgent decisions of the Court Berlin Administrative on August 28, 2020. “This means that the two assembly bans by the police chief in Berlin are temporarily suspended for this day.”

The police prepared about 3,000 people, regardless of the specific outcome of the legal dispute, for a major operation over the weekend. Organizers of the lateral thinking initiative 711 had called for the rally on Saturday and expected around 22,000 participants on Straße des 17. Juni, near the Brandenburg Gate. A longer demonstration was planned in advance through Berlin-Mitte. The authority of the police assembly had prohibited these important actions and several minor events.

As a reason for the prohibition order, he had given that the gathering of tens of thousands of people, often without a mask or distance, created too high a health risk for the population. This was already demonstrated by the demonstration against the Crown policy on August 1 in Berlin, during which most of the protesters consciously ignored hygiene rules.

The Berlin Administrative Court decided on Friday that the meeting could take place. He stated that there were no prerequisites for a ban. No imminent danger to public safety can be inferred from either the course of the August 1 demonstration or the critical attitude of the participants towards crown policy. The organizers had presented a hygiene concept and agreed with 900 files and 100 “de-escalation kits”. The country had not properly verified the conditions for the demonstration.

The initiator of the rally, Michael Ballweg, has already described the decision of first instance, the Berlin Administrative Court, on Friday afternoon as a “complete success”. He stressed that the demonstration must be peaceful.

The Berlin police were concerned about the “open will to use violence” formulated on the Internet, as Vice President Marco Langner put it. There are also many calls from right-wing extremists to attend the meetings. 3,000 police officers should be available in the capital, 1,000 of them from other federal states and from the federal police, police authorities said Friday afternoon.

Berlin’s red-red-green Senate and the police had to receive wide criticism due to the ban order. Interior senator Andreas Geisel (SPD) also said about the ban on demonstrations that he did not want to accept that Berlin would once again become the scene of “Crown deniers, Reich citizens and right-wing extremists.”

German Finance Minister and Vice Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) called on participants in Saturday’s anti-crown rally in Berlin to remain in peace and adhere to hygiene rules. “Those who demonstrate peacefully on the weekend must do so and respect the well-known rules of hygiene and distance,” said Scholz of the “Rheinische Post” in Düsseldorf (Saturday edition). “The right to demonstrate is a valuable asset in our democracy, as is the protection of the health of citizens.” The same applies to the police.